How necessary is Grounded?

Is Grounded a skippable power for an electric brute? My energy resistance is already nearly capped in my early 20s, and I can pick up immob and knockback protection through Combat Jumping and a KB prot IO (or Acrobatics). But I have yet to see an /elec build that skips Grounded. What am I missing? Is the end drain resistance that noticeable?

Edit: And yes I realize CJ and Acro would mean taking 2 powers instead of 1. But I was planning to take CJ anyway and use a KB IO, I only mentioned Acro because I realized while typing that's another option.

Its pretty neccessary. You could do without it, but why?

A single -Kb IO isnt enough for what a brute does. So youd have to slot at least 2, and youd still get knocked around more than youd like. But a single -kb is perfect for those odd times when clipping issues tell the server youre not actually on the ground....

End Drain Resist, -KB, and Immob protection all in a nice little package.

I think it's a great a power, very useable. The -KB is plenty, just don't take fly.

I wouldn't skip it now that there are -KB IOs to cover some of that weakness when airborne. There will be will that rare occasion where you'll find yourself ping-ponged due to the limited KB protection. My most recent example came when fighting the Hamidon in LGTF. It's embarassing when my avatar of terror and destruction (brute, of course) is flung around the battle field.

Personally I'm on the fence about Grounded. It offers me essentially one thing in my build, about 1/3 of my negative energy resistance at no further cost in endurance usage. The kb and immobilize protection are both covered by powers and IO's that I would be taking and using anyway. The end drain resistance is trivial at best, particularly by my current level. Hip deep in dying Carnies with the dread Mask of Vitiation on me couldn't effectively drain me as is with no Grounded. Instead I was draining them dry. And it does "all" this at the cost of a power choice.

Still it has been painful at times facing things like Vampyri, Spectrals and or even the Carnies mentioned above owing to their use of negative energy attacks.

Really seems to boil down to increasing my negative energy resistance by about 11% or so to a total of about 33% for a power choice in a tight build. And negative energy is still going to tend to be painful.

So right now the plan is one build will have it and one won't and seeing how they compare.

Elec armor has a lot of necessary power picks, I'm not sure if I could drop anything save maybe lightning reflexes, and I still need at least tough, and probably weave, to make up for the lack of S/L r/d.

Compared to my blaster, my brute has had some tough build decisions. I've had to forgo any patron powers so I could boost my anemic S/L levels.

I never took grounded for it's KB aspect. It was more about the end drain resist, neg-en resistance, and a power with auto +res to slot some nice IOs. The KB aspect was 'nice' but nowadays when slotting for DEF to layer with your resistance, you end up with ridiculous amounts of -KB anyway.

For me the KB prot of grouded was icing on the cake, and the power was never left out of any ela build I made.

It's been touched on slightly, but I dropped Ela for one reason: Hami raids. I used to do them too often to warrant keeping my Ela around. Grounded does nothing against hami and it makes me a very sad panda. I also got tired of getting hit by an immob, trying to use SJ or something else to move away and end up getting stuck to the ground.

Also, cimerorans used to rip me a big hole.

The way i see it, you can either take this one power, and get some great combat knockback portection, or you can skip it and try and work 3 -kb IO's in your build somewhere. (only 2 doesnt feel like its enough for a brute or scrapper... to me anyways.) Oh, and you'd need to train combat jumping too. And you'd still lose out on some massive -end resistence.

Grounded has ALOT going for it. -end drain. -knockback. - Immob. +nrg and nnrg... all in one little package you don't even need to slot. And if you DO slot it, you can add a steadfast for travel knockback protection (so you don't get knocked down when you hopping around) or a +3 def/resist IO for some exrta defence.

You get a suppresing amount of utility from that little power, i can't imagain not training it.

Thing is, you can replace a lot of the things it does without using up the power slot. It does do a lot of useful things, but /elec is so darn tight that sometimes, something's gotta go. Combat jumping is not really a sacrifice since you were presumably going to be getting a travel anyway, and even 1 -kb in combat jumping is enough to stop 90+% of all the knockback you'll see. Yeah, you lose out on the free slot to stick the 3% in, as well as the neg and -end resist, but you gain a priceless free power slot. Sometimes, depending on primary, that might be worth it.

I would get the power. Prob doesnt need more than the one slot though. If you wanted to skip it, you probably wouldn't notice all that much, especially if you can get ur defense up a bit. Several sets have neg nrg defense in them, which would prove helpful.

Grounded is basically free energy/neg res with knockback protection that is still there even if you have no end left (as long as your on the floor). It also has about 64% end redux resist in it which is very useful but does bring you up to about 170% resist which is way more than you'll need as far as i can guess.

TBH grounded is useful but it's not a necessity, if your build would be better off with a different power then go for the other power, but if not grounded doesn't hurt =)

the main reasons these days is to pick it up for the resistance to negative energy damage (though small) and the resistance to endurance draining mobs which you'll see occasionally 1-40 (Freaks, Mu, Cogs) and very frequently from 40-50 (Malta, Carnies, Mu, Freaks).

This End drain Resistance combined with ELA's capped Energy resistance makes Scirocco's Patron arc a joke, just as a tip when selecting patron contacts.